


I Think We've Met Before

by the_sockpuppet



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-25
Updated: 2015-01-25
Packaged: 2018-03-09 01:07:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,667
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3230456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_sockpuppet/pseuds/the_sockpuppet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Korra is Asami's ex-wife, and Kuvira is the best friend that simply loves them both. </p>
<p>Modern AU Korrasami & Korvirasami friendship.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Think We've Met Before

**Author's Note:**

> I was listening to Stars' Your Ex-Lover Is Dead, and also Dead Hearts.

**_What Korra Says_ **

 

"It was terrible, Kuvi."

"Oh yeah? That boring?"

"I bumped into my ex-wife. Actually the guy who threw the whole damn ball introduced her to me. Oh yeah, I've heard of her, 'Sami Sato. Course. Nice to meet ya."

Kuvira laughs. "C'mon Kuvi, can't you be nice? Jeez."

"Oh god. She must have been perfect the whole time."

"Hey, I was too. Perfect poker face. Didn't ruin the guy's night by saying, listen, buddy, we used to be married at some point."

"So. You two talked?"

"What, about her never being around, me never being around, and thank the spirits we didn't have kids or they'd be depressed and it'd be our fault?"

"Yeah."

"No. We didn't talk. We said hi to each other. Real pleasant."

It's fake wood on the bar counter. Warm and brown. It's not too cold. Korra drinks: she raises her head, knocks it back. It splashes down her tongue and into her throat. Hot and intoxicating, a familiar sensation. She sees Asami's face as she closes her eyes, and thinks she needs another drink. _I bumped into my ex-wife._

She knows what Kuvira's annoyance is all about. _She's our best friend, remember?_

_Yes_ , Korra thinks. _I remember._ Saying it out loud would make it real, and she would like to pretend.

Korra can't sit still. She touches her hair. Slides the empty glass from one hand to another. She never thought, when she was younger, that she'd be going home alone and washed out at thirty-eight. She says that out loud, because she has had three glasses of wine, and a few other drinks since sitting with Kuvira.

"You're not that old to be washed out, Kor."

"I'm going to end up like Lin."

"No you're not. Lin's actually happy. You're pathetic."

Even after drinking, Korra can recognize how protective Kuvira is of her adopted mother. It's cute. That feeling comes from another time, long ago, Sundays with the Beifongs of Republic City.

"I am pathetic," Korra enunciates. "I've survived covering all the conflicts from the ends of the bloody earth, and I'm pathetic. I'm awesome, you know? everyone wants to shake my fucking hand. but I'm pathetic."

"You're pathetic. You're awesome. You're drunk. C'mon."

"I don't want us to get back together."

"No pressure," Kuvira says. Korra knows it's true, even though Kuvira's dearest wish is for things to go back to normal. _Live through this, and you won't look back._ There is no going back. She served the papers, Asami signed 'em.

"You know why? Because we're never around each other."

"I know."

"Because I'm always gone and she's always making something else."

"I know."

"I don't think it's humanly possible for people like me to love. That's something for ordinary people. I'm not ordinary."

"Nope, you're special. A special snowflake."

"You always think love's gonna work things out. And it doesn't."

"Hey hey hey," Kuvira says, catching Korra. "Okay, that's it. it'll be all over the news if you start crying in public. They'll talk about your ex-wife."

Korra stops crying. She can't have that.

The door opens, and in walks Asami Sato. (Of course, this was their favorite bar.) Beautiful like the morning, untouched by the years, withdrawn and taut, all at the same time. Nothing changes. The atmosphere doesn't magically become charged. She eyerolls at Korra. Korra tries to eyeroll back. It fails to hit the intended target, for Asami Sato leaves.

 

* * *

 

 

**_What Kuvira Thinks_ **

 

Korra tries to stand up. She can, in a way. She can, as long as she's holding on to something. Kuvira immediately stands and offers a limb.

"Korra," Kuvira says, this time with a little force. "Yeah, yeah, yeah," Korra says. "I'm sad."

Kuvi half drags Korra to the door. Of course, it has to rain. The world has to agree with Korra. It's a sad night, it's washed in blue, it's cold, damp, the end of the world, all because someone introduced Asami Sato to her ex-wife, and now the rain has to play along. It has to play along to the hilt, it must send out the largest teardrops the world has ever seen, the spirits must cry for their favorite soap opera, the end of the golden couple, oh dear, oh dear. Kuvira damns all the viewers of this grand soap opera to hell, and drags Korra into the rain.

_Splash splash splash splash splash._ They make their way to the car, without umbrellas of course, because the umbrellas are inside. Kuvi makes Korra lean on a very wet VW Beetle while she opens the door. Then she shoves Korra in the back. She picks up two umbrellas. Opens one. Splashes her way to the pretty lady Korra always calls her ex-wife, as though they didn't grow up together, all three.

"You're not going to get a taxi tonight," she tells Asami, who is standing adamantly on the thin strip of dry concrete, barely covered by the shingles of the roof. She's protected by a curtain of rain that pours between them, separating roof from open sky.

Asami laughs. "Oh spirits, tonight's a bad joke."

"Joke's on me, I'm the one who has to drive you both home." _Because someone has to be decent._

"The Sato estate is closer," Asami says.

Going home isn't easy. She's the driver to an ex-couple, who happen to be her friends (not that they were around very often these days). Thankfully they're not talking. The rain presses on her old car. The world contracts into the space inside the car. They're dancing to a lopsided waltz, the three of them. _We're friends, aren't we?_ She'd never ask such a corny question, but it hurts to be in between two people hurting because of each other. And it hurts to be in between two people who love each other.

Kuvi thinks of the lunches they used to have, in university. How it went on for a short while after they graduated. She thinks of how thankful she is that they're still alive. How glad she is, that they're in the same car, that they can pretend they went out drinking, the closest of friends, like they used to. It feels like she's grasping for straws. Maybe she is a little tipsy, to be thankful for so little. She wants to hit both of these ex-lovebirds for being so stupid. For ruining their lunches.

Asami hands her a jacket. "You're shivering, Kuvi."

_This place rains too damn much._ It's all water outside, pouring over the glass, muddling things, making light from the streetlamps reflect and drop. Kuvira wouldn't be surprised if she could draw a dick with her fingers from the fog, when it comes to their windows.

"Have you been alright lately?"

"I'm fine," Asami says. "Company's doing well." She always looks down when she talks about herself as the Asami of Future Industries, not the Asami of her own. High society girl, wrapped up in politeness, can't ever say a nasty word. Korra taught her all the swear words, how to cut class, how to kiss under a tree. And Kuvi would be happy for them, but this isn't a happy ending.

"You're not the damn company."

Asami doesn't answer, which speaks louder for Kuvira. The company is all she has left. She had boys, she had girls, she had Mako, she had Korra, but they walked out of each other's doors. It was a mutually strange disassociation. How it happened was a mystery even to those who did it. How could the golden pair break up? The poster children of true love, their falling out was driftless enough that it wrecked the faith of hopeful kids everywhere. For Kuvi it simply meant her best friends were gone. They'd never ask her to take sides. so she couldn't be with Korra, or asami. For a cold, weird kid who never paid attention to what everyone else was looking at, it simply damned her to a lifetime of work and impersonality.

"How are you?"

"Fine."

"I heard you got promoted to like, lead homicide detective."

"Yeah."

"You and Mako make a great team."

_I hate you shitheads_ , Kuvi thinks, but doesn't say. Her anger is fleeting, thanks to the drinks. Spirits, can't they have sleepovers like they used to? Can't they go on trips like they used to?

They make it up to the lovely Sato estate.

Asami speaks without looking at Kuvi. "There are guest rooms."

_Yeah duh, we slept in them all_ , Kuvi wants to say. She says thank you instead. Drags Korra in (by herself, because spirits know Asami will combust if she touches her ex-lover.) Dumps Korra on the carpet. Checks to see if Korra's still breathing. Makes sure she hasn't puked or anything. Rummages through the closet, finds a decent shirt, tugs off Korra's tops, puts the damn shirt on, finally dumps the woman onto the bed.

In the dark, with the flare of electric, turn-of-the-century lamps, Kuvira wishes she were a kid, hiding from all the other kids, reading a book while they can't find her in an eternal hide-and-seek. Korra would never give up. They'd never find Kuvira, hiding in a supposedly haunted attic's closet.

The hallways are so still.

Everyone's got their own lives.

Everyone says _you're doing so well._

So well? So well. Living alone, dying on take out, abnormally high cholesterol for someone so young (and supposedly so fit), asking herself what she's here for at all -- yeah, she's doing well. She's doing so well. She's successful. That's what the rest of the world says. Won't someone take one look at her the way Korra used to and say -- _no, you're not okay_? Of course not. She's got a hell of a poker face. A hell of a grown up face. A hell of a disposition. She's a detective. And no one looks very deeply at anything.

Who's she kidding? Kuvi just wants to go home.

 

* * *

 

**_What Asami Sato Remembers_ **

 

In the morning, Asami sees Korra swinging around the branches of the trees around the estate. She's always been that far. Nothing will change, even if they love each other. In last night's haze, she remembers Korra's face. At some point in her life, she was cupping that face. Kissing the lips there. Breaking the skin on Korra's neck.

It's too early in the morning to remember their first days. But with Korra so close, Asami can't help herself. This is a big mistake, she realizes, but it's too late. She thinks of sitting in Korra's lap, sunlight on her back, her lover's hands on her tits. She thinks of tiny fights that are refereed by Kuvira, thinks of movie nights where the three of them fall asleep on the bed. Thinks of hilarious conversations from outsiders about how awkward it must be for Kuvi -- but they just don't get it. It had been them against the world, once upon a time. The three of them. A lover and a best friend, what more could she ask for?

If she can just live through this morning, she'll be able to go back to her life.

If only she had a beer, or a hangover, she'd have an excuse to cry. _But you've already put on your makeup!_ Thank the spirits for makeup.

She hears the door close and the crunch of grass, but isn't sure of what she's doing. Or where her feet are taking her. Right there, in a blink, she faces Korra, who falls on the grass without any grace at the sight of her. _Here's a ghost_ , Asami thinks of herself. _I'm a ghost, and Korra's terrified._

"Morning," Korra says. One must be polite to ghosts. Especially ghosts that don't live in the dark.

"Hi."

"Sorry for the intrusion."

Those words are utterly foreign, for Korra to say them, for Asami to hear them. Korra was always coming in and out of the mansion, breaking things, exploring, digging with plastic spades.

"It's not a problem."

"I have an assignment in the Earth Kingdom, I leave tonight. I'd... best get going."

Torn between relief that she doesn't have to sit breakfast with Korra, and her hopes being maybe crushed (why, why, why?), Asami nods.

Korra beats a hasty retreat. Asami stays standing, looking at where Korra was swinging around like a monkey. Terrified of returning to a cycle of being gone, she finds herself afraid of her feelings. There is no trying again, no resetting this video game. Finality is finality. There's no patching this up.

Asami sits on the porch, watching her younger self sit with a younger Korra in the shade. _Those were kids I once knew_ , she thinks, looking at the specters of their past.

She has to make herself tea, because the morning is cold.

Kuvira's at the breakfast table. The sight of her, with Republic City papers on the table, her black coffee -- Asami once thought this would be their future. The three of them, living in an apartment if not the mansion, friends till the end. Not gone home to their own spaces, not absent from each other's lives, their absence so felt that everything in their lives has gone to covering up the disappearance.

Kuvira's still pretty in that severe way, sharp cheekbones and jaw defined by the light of the morning sun. Even with her long hair, she carries an androgynous look, in how she moves and how she looks; not for the first time Asami is surprised she's chosen not to date.

"Okay, is staring a new hobby for you?"

"Sorry," Asami mutters, taking a seat across her. "I just, haven't seen you in a while."

"Yeah, a few years. That's a while, huh?"

"I was surprised you'd offer me a ride, to be honest."

"Don't be stupid, 'Sami."

Kuvira says it so sharply that Asami can only wonder how deep the cut must be in her, and how much of that cut is her fault.

"Korra's already leaving."

If they keep talking like this they'll end up leaving too, because they both find it impolite to burst into frustrated tears.

Kuvira wisely chooses not to say anything. She shoves the toast into her mouth and reads the news.

The rhythm of breakfast is broken when Korra arrives, on her way to the door with a quick wave.

"Korra, you fucker, eat something. Can't you fucking be a proper guest and sit down?"

"I --I don't think that's a good idea," Korra mutters.

"I'm not going to wait until the goddamn funeral for us to stop running away from this."

"My being here is giving everyone a headache." Korra opens the door and closes it.

_Bang!_ She's gone. To accompany that, Kuvira bangs the table like a kid. Asami's left to pick up the pieces.

"It's fine, Kuvi."

"Are you just going to let her run off like that?"

"What would change if I caught up to her this time?"

"I don't know! But it's better than us being like this. How can you be fine with it?"

Asami stands up. She's never been good with confrontation. "Kuvu, I'm sorry but... I don't have time for this either." When Kuvira makes to speak some more, Asami loses her patience. "You can't force us to talk to each other. She makes me too angry, okay? Maybe it _is_ better this way."

_That's what you get,_ Asami thinks viciously, _for pushing the issue. Classic Kuvira._

* * *

 

 

**_What Korra Feels_ **

 

She hasn't packed. She's lying down in an unmade bed (it hasn't been made for the past week). All her clothes are on the floor. _Truth is_ , Korra thinks, _you never get used to being alone, sleeping alone, waking alone._ _After a certain amount of time, assumptions burrow deep: that maybe it's your turn to take out the trash, or her turn to clean the bathroom._ Then there's the sudden _ding!_ in the brain, but it's not the good kind of light in the dark of Korra's head. It's the _ding_ that says, idiot, it's always your turn to take care of your life.

It's fucking hilarious, because they were only like that -- like an actual couple -- when they were younger. After a certain point neither of them were in the bed at the same time. And yet those habits persisted. Korra laughs into the dead, stale air of her apartment. The curtains are drawn, the windows are closed, she'll be gone for two weeks, she lies under the covers naked. For all the softness of her sheets and comforter, no amount of softness will ever compare to the softness of another woman in bed. One woman in particular.

 Someone had once said: you have only one life. If you give it away, it is gone.

Another wise person had said: If you live only for yourself, you carry death with you.

Korra's too old to brush those words aside like an edgy teenager with all the answers. At some point you wake up and you find that you know less than you did when you were thirteen and angry and had the world all figured out. (Back then, it simply sucked.)

Korra hasn't packed.

She should be packing.

She should be going to the Earth Kingdom and covering the reparation efforts of the former Royal Family.

It's so terribly difficult to get out of bed, even if there's nothing in it.

The world outside has never been so hard to understand. She's afraid of hearing words. She's afraid to hear them strung together. She's afraid to hear whole speeches, to ask herself what it means. It's what she does everyday, and every day the world makes less sense to her.

_Has the situation in the Earth Kingdom improved from that of fifty years ago?_

Surely it has! The papers are full of praise. No one wants to hear the story that quite possibly some of the states are hoarding the given resources, that perhaps there is no trickle-down effect. Everything is getting better, all the time.

_Everything's getting better, all the time._

And if Korra shifts her thoughts just a little closer to home, there's not any improvement. _Korra sighted running away from ex-wife's mansion. Famous journalist seen fighting with lead homicide detective..._

Korra still wonders how time brought her from Point A to Point B. Sometimes she thinks, is it because things were too easy for us? They went to the same school, passed into the same university. Their lives were so conveniently next to each other, so easily attuned. And the minute they graduated and decided on lives of their own: it sounds so easy to be in love until you spend eight hours five times a week away from someone you slept with, someone it feels you were born with. And that's the minimum, really -- Korra was always gone, or Asami was always gone. They thought: this is it, we're adults, this is who we are, this is what we have to do. Life tugged at them in opposite directions. They had others to think about, Future Industries for her, the wide wide world for Korra.

Maybe it was because they were so used to things being easy. Putting in actual effort suddenly became too inconvenient. It's the symptom of the modern world: that everyone wants everything in a snap, beautifully packaged, perfect, paid for in cash.

Was it ever love? This is why Korra will never know if she's capable of that abstraction. Is it fair to think of the equation in terms of Asami versus the world?

But Korra knows that the strongest of her sins is to her closest friend. (Oh, is this a competition? To whom had she done the most damage?) Kuvi alone had tried, when both of them were establishing their careers, to remind them: _Come for dinner, I'm cooking._ Korra sees Kuvira in her mind's eye, getting off work early, begging for a leave in a job that never ends. She can see Kuvira reading recipes at work, going home with groceries, turning off stoves at the right time, burning her finger, picking up the phone with her good hand and realizing that nope, neither of them are showing up.

_Sorry Kuvi! The prototype isn't working yet._

_Hi, this is Korra! I'm out at the moment doing awesome stuff, but if you leave a message we can do awesome things together sometime._

And yet when she called for Kuvira yesterday, the detective had made time. Had made it feel like things hadn't been so fucked between the three of them. Hot, shameful tears could fall off Korra's face, but the truth is it's a cold sadness she feels. She knows she doesn't have the right to cry.

The world measures love in grand gestures. The truth is that love grows in small places and erodes in small things. The two hours needed to cook. The Sundays spent asleep in bed. Weekends disappearing into cleaning the apartment and shopping for the next week's dinners. Korra never had time for that. Asami never had time for that. So they ate takeout under the electric light of their offices. So someone else cleaned the apartment, because neither of them lived in it. So answering machines spoke for them: _I love you._

Korra used to repeat that recording, until one day she turned the machine off and threw the thing away. She got another answering machine that didn't have the old messages in 'em. It'd never heard of Kuvu's voice, or 'Sami's. Good machine.

How had the golden couple tripped over something so obvious?

The clock beeps.

The world isn't going to stop because someone fell down in the race all living creatures pretend to compete in.

She has only herself to blame if no one helps her up.

So Korra gets out of bed, her toes brushing against her shirt in the ground.

She's got a job to do.

It's the only thing she has left.

**Author's Note:**

> Concrit welcome as always. If you guys want something explored in the conclusion, leave your suggestions. I can give no guarantees I'll put it in, but if a suggestion resonates, I will do it. As usual, interested readers can check ateliersockpuppet . tumblr . com for the occasional note on when this will update with the conclusion.


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